Auribus Teneo Lupum
by General Corteau
Summary: The Wizarding World is the most powerful civilization on the planet. Or so they think. When a SWAT team sniper kills Lord Voldemort as he conducts a raid after fleeing the Battle of Hogwarts, how will the Magical World react? One thing is for certain. Muggles are not just harmless, stupid creatures anymore. No - they are truly a force to be reckoned with. Warning: cuss words.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: This world and the characters in it are adapted from the world of Harry Potter by JK Rowling. I do not claim to own any of these characters or places, nor do I claim that this story is a part of the original canon of the Harry Potter series.

(A/N): This is a tale that I've been meaning to write for a long time, so hopefully you guys like it.

* * *

A bright crescent moon hung in the sky, casting a pleasant white light down onto the shopping district below. The bright yellowish-white lamps bathed everything with a warm and bright hue.

Crickets chirped and owls hooted, but above all the normal ambient sounds of the night were the squealing whine of police sirens and the furious crunch of gravel and dirt under the boots of a SWAT team. As the swirling red and blue lights swept across the walls of the shops, creating a light effect that hurt the eyes of spectators watching from afar, the team moved in. They surrounded an innocent, manila-walled coffee shop in the middle of a wealthy shopping district in London, careful not to stand in front of the police lights as to not give away their position. They warily eyed the dark alleyways between the buildings that surrounded them, watching for any sign of movement.

"We're in position."

The crackle of radio chatter floated through the earpiece of one Officer Atticus. He perched on the dark roof of a nearby shop, peering down a sniper scope at the windows of shop. The rough shingles scraped against his belly as he shifted his weight, adjusting for the uncomfortable position he was in. A light wind caressed his face.

 _It's a shame that such a beautiful night has to be ruined by these idiots_. _What a perfect night to go out with my wife and have a nice dinner._

Crouching low in the bushes that surrounded their target, one of the team members took out a tiny mirror, angling it so it caught sight of the inside of the shop. Inside the warmly lit interior, numerous hostages were being held by several robbers, demanding money and credit cards from the cashiers. Several of them were also hunkered down behind counters and tables that had been overturned in the initial chaos, aiming their guns outside, although the blinding and disorienting lights of the police cars half-blinded them, and kept them in a constant state of wearied anxiety.

Officer Atticus, looking through his scope, saw one of the hostages, a blond young man who looked as if he was still in college, quake in fear. His tormenter, a large and powerfully built man with a nasty looking assault rifle, kicked him aside, aiming the barrel of his gun at him. He was roaring words at the poor blonde man, who was now crying and throwing all his money and his wallet towards the robber.

His fingers tense on the trigger, Officer Atticus growled a few warnings towards the team on the ground: "Be advised: one hostage is getting pretty roughed up by one of our targets. Do I have permission to shoot if he gets violent, sir?" He addressed the last part of the question to his superior officer, Atkins, who was watching the operation with binoculars.

Atkins replied negative.

Atticus' eyebrows furrowed. He didn't like what he was hearing. Was he to just sit by and idle as he watched an innocent victim get killed? It went against every one of his moral fibres. But he knew his Atkins was right. If he shot because one man got killed, the rest of the robbers could just execute the rest of the hostages. As horrible as it sounded, one man was not worth the potential deaths of twenty plus others. He peered through his scope intently as he tried to figure out a good way to efficiently eliminate all the targets.

 _Perhaps I could shoot that one behind the counter with that submachine gun_ , he thought. _If he gets killed, they won't do as much damage, since none of the rest have automatics…_

As he planned out a strategy, a bead of sweat rolled down his forehead. It hovered over his eyelashes on his right eye, which he had closed, as he was peering down the scope with this left. Continuing to plan, he raised his hand to wipe off the pesky droplet.

 _Crack. Crack. Crack._

Fifteen cracks echoed throughout the apartments, each one distinct and harsh.

Atticus' heartrate spiked, and he twitched.

His hand, halfway to his eye, slammed back down to the ground to re-steady himself. It knocked against his rifle, which, to compensate for the sudden force, shifted its position and its sights, now pointing up at the starry sky.

 _Shit._

" _What the hell_ do you think you're doing?" exclaimed Officer Atkins over the coms. "I gave you specific orders not to shoot, you could have caused a disas—"

The shop's loudspeakers blared to life.

"Looks like you're making some unwarranted moves out there, officers. I think we'll have to teach you all a lesson."

The person speaking, a man with brown hair and a hawk-like nose, aimed a gun towards one of the hostages, a poor middle-aged woman who immediately started to plea, bursting into tears. A wet stain started to spread between the legs of her jeans, painfully clear through the white fabric.

"No!" burst out Officer Atkins, on the café speakers system that their team had connected to. "Don't shoot! We can still talk this out!"

The man simply sneered as his finger tensed. Officer Atticus, having finally readjusted his scope in the last few heart-pounding seconds, aimed for the kill, his fingers ready to pull the trigger. His superior's warnings, issued what seemed to be a lifetime ago, were barely on his thoughts as he prepared to fire.

Forcing himself to steady his breathing, his eyes narrowed in cold calculation as he aimed exactly where he wanted to hit.

 _Boom._

The windows to the café exploded into a violent cloud of sparkling, sharp slivers. For a moment, everything seemed to stand still, a shimmering cloud of reflective and deadly projectiles scattering red, blue, yellow, and white lights all throughout the area.

Time resumed. The cloud hurtled outwards, spears of glass flying past, and in some cases, into police officers, hostages, and robbers. Immediately, the groans and whimpers of wounded men and women filled the air.

Two more jets of red light arced into the shop, blasting both hostages and robbers off their feet and accidentally setting off many firearms. Screams emanated from the café, now on fire. The alarms wailed, water sprinklers activating and sending a shower of cold water down on the people below.

The SWAT team had been sent keeling from the concussion waves produced by the explosion. The entire police chatter channel was filled with officers yelling in panic and asking for orders from their superiors. Every officer in the vicinity of the shop drew their weapons, ready to burst inside and eliminate any robbers that remained, if any remained living at all.

Atticus, flinching instinctively away from his rifle, spied one of them shakily clambered to his feet, yelling into his coms.

"What the hell happened there?" he screamed. "None of you told us that they had rigged the entire place to explode! I think that's some pretty serious fu—"

 _Boom_. This time, a police car, the orange glow of an expanding fireball lighting the shop like an angry nighttime sun. Atticus ducked as a particularly large chunk of metal whistled past his right ear with only a few feet to spare.

He paused there for a second, eyes wide, breath held.

 _That. Was close._

Withdrawing his face from the safe little nook between his arms and the roof, he cautiously peered down at the chaotic scene. Eyes wide, he drank in the horrifying scene.

It was like the aftermath of a tiny nuclear explosion.

Everyone within ten feet of the car was either ripped apart, shredded to bits, or reduced to gore. One man was lying face down on the ground, his blood splattered in a five-foot radius circle. A hole in his right ribcage sputtered out the dark red liquid, a tiny Cupid's fountain coming straight from the heart. Only six feet away from him lay Officer Perkins, one of Atticus' good friends. His distinct police badge was turned to a multicolored emblem, painted by the insides of his very own body.

Everyone within thirty feet had been knocked to the ground. Some seemed to be sporting serious concussions, judging by the way they were faintly grasping at the ground in an attempt to get up.

With a start, Atticus realized that the car was the one carrying all the munitions and tactical explosives.

A sudden motion from the very corner of his eye caught his attention, and he turned to look. Green light arced out from the alley to the right of the house Atticus was aiming from. It hit a SWAT officer who was screaming into his coms, gazing in horror at the scene, and he dropped like a stone. His voice disappeared immediately from the chatter, the abrupt silence it left behind compounding the ringing in everyone's ears.

Everyone still alive and standing burst into action.

" _All forces be advised, hostiles are firing at us from behind! We are being flanked! I repeat, we are being flanked!"_ Officer Atkins roared into his coms, before he flipped over his car and landed on the other side, aiming through the windows at the alley from which the lights had come from. Other officers had forgone communication, and simply tossed grenades into the alley from whence the hostiles were attacking. Explosions rattled Officer Atticus' perch, and he nearly lost his balance and knocked his rifle from its stand. He managed to steady himself, just in time to hear several more pops and cracks.

He watched in horror as roughly ten black figures in long, dark robes spontaneously appeared on the roof of his adjacent building. He, luckily, was wearing non-reflective gear and was coated in all black, blending in perfectly to the dark roof, so they did not notice him. All ten pointed at the cops on the ground, who were still concentrated on the alley.

Ten arcs of blood-red light reached for their targets.

The earth itself shook as ten explosions simultaneously wreaked havoc on the SWAT forces, outright killing half of the remaining team, and seriously injuring the rest as the rest of cop cars exploded in response to the sudden stresses. Six more roaring fireballs, glowing like the sun and casting so much light that Atticus was afraid he had been seen, erupted from the now blackened and bent vehicles.

The men in black were roaring with laughter, maliciously teleporting back down to the ground to finish off the remaining SWAT forces, and eliminated the rest of the robbers and the moaning hostages.

 _Shit._ Atticus' heart was in his throat now. It was not only that these men had eliminated his entire force. No, it was because he knew who they were.

 _Death eaters_.

His wife, Maggie, had warned him about the war that was going on in the wizarding world, the world from whence she had departed, after the rising power of the Dark Lord had prevented Muggleborns like her from living peaceful, or even safe, lives.

The Death Eaters, if he could recall, were the Dark Lord's personal henchmen, and they loved to terrorize non-magical people like him. They were extremely dangerous. His wife's words to him echoed in his mind.

 _Never, and I mean_ never _, engage them. They will find you, and if they do …_ Maggie's warning had trailed off, and she looked distinctly brooding. " _I don't care what happens to anyone else. I don't want you to get hurt,"_ she had said. " _If you don't care, then do it for me. If they know you've seen me, they might come after me too."_ Of course, he could not _ever_ risk his wife's life, not if he could do anything about it. So, despite his aching heart and his building fury, he remained silent and watched the proceedings.

One of the Death Eaters had gone into the shop and was eliminating the rest of the hostages, when his eye caught something that he rather liked.

"Let's have a little fun, shall we?" He sneered, dragging out a late-teenage woman from the café shop who was fighting desperately to get free of her new assailants. "She's rather pretty isn't she … I think a dirty Muggle like her would love to spread her legs for real, powerful men like us. She would probably –"

He was cut off by a final crack that announced a final arrival to the scene.

Atticus' rage at their actions vanished immediately, his fear completely inundating him. He couldn't tell if the wet patch between his legs was real or just imagined.

It was the Dark Lord himself.

By this time, Atticus' heart was thumping against his chest furiously. His blood threatening to burst out of his temples, he waited in tense agony as he realized just how much trouble he was in. If they saw him, Atticus was sure they would make him wish he had just shot himself right then and there.

He did his best to calm himself down. Taking numerous deep breaths, he formulated a contingency plan. Just to be sure, Atticus aimed his sniper at the head honcho himself. If they spotted him and tried to kill him – well, he would make _damned_ sure that he would at least try to take that bastard with him. He held his breath and waited. Every single second seemed like a small eternity.

"My friends," Lord Voldemort smirked. "What a fine night it is."

"Yes, my lord," replied all the Death Eaters dutifully.

The one who had captured the girl, a man with long blonde hair, bowed dutifully to his Lord. "My Lord, I have captured this girl. We were about to have some fun with her. My Lord, if you wish, I would be happy –"

"Silence, Lucius," barked Voldemort. Lucius halted immediately, quaking with surprise and a little fear. "Are you, perhaps, giving me _permission_ to do what I want? Hmmm, Lucius?" he ended threateningly.

"N- No, my Lord," Lucius whimpered. "I'm sorry, my Lord. I beg you to forgive this offense. It shall never happen again, my Lord."

Lord Voldemort sneered at his henchman. "It had better not. If it does, Lucius, need I remind you that your wife and son …" he trailed off. "Nevertheless, this creature of yours does seem quite pleasing. Take her back to the Manor, Lucius. We can keep her as a little pet, meant to service us when we desire it. I think that –"

"My lord," another Death Eater interrupted. Lord Voldemort snarled in rage at the man's sheer audacity and turned upon the wizard, the killing curse forming upon his lips. The man continued hurriedly, aware that he was moments away from death. "There is someone watching us."

Officer Atticus nearly fainted then and there. He flickered his eyes away from the scope and looked at the Death Eater who spoke, who, sure enough, was looking right at him.

His heart blood pressure skyrocketed, and the world spun slightly. He was fairly sure he was suffering a stroke right then and there.

Voldemort narrowed his eyes, turned, and immediately spotted him, smirking. "Thought you could stay hidden, hm? Enjoy your last moments on earth, _Muggle_." He chuckled, a raspy sound that reminded Atticus of a snake. The Death Eaters behind him processed the sound, and then heartily added their own villain-laughs. "Avada Kedavra," the Dark Lord drawled, pointing his bone-white wand at Atticus.

Atticus knew he was dead, but he had one final job to complete before he left this world. He had to protect not only his wife and child, but that poor girl on the ground. As the green light grew ever larger in his field of view, Atticus mentally sneered at his smug and arrogant pasty white face. _This is for my wife and for everyone you've killed and hurt, you sonuvabich_ , he thought.

He pulled the trigger.

Just before the green light overtook him and washed away his vision, he viewed the glorious result of his work. A shocked expression appeared on Lord Voldemort's reptilian face as a hole spontaneously appeared in his skull. Amidst screams of shock and roars of rage, the Dark Lord dropped, felled by a single Muggle weapon.

 _Take that, you bastard._ Atticus smirked as he felt the green spell impact him and immediately drain his life force.

Darkness claimed him.

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(A/N): Make sure to read and _Review!_ Next chapter will be the true start of the story and will be uploaded soon.


	2. Chapter 1 - Taken

Disclaimer: This world and the characters in it are adapted from the world of Harry Potter by JK Rowling. I do not claim to own any of these characters or places, nor do I claim that this story is a part of the original canon of the Harry Potter series.

(A/N): Yay! First real chapter, I hope you like it. We'll be introduced to our main character in this chapter.

* * *

I awoke with a start. My last dream had been particularly vivid. I had been at one of my favorite coffee shops, _The Swirls_ , staying up late at night working on one of my papers for English class. The Imperial High School of London was well-known for strong engineering and science departments, and I was well on my path to becoming a successful female researcher by going there. English, though, was one of my most hated subjects, and I was highly annoyed at having to take English classes to graduate from the high school.

Breaking from my rapidly wandering thoughts, I refocused my attention back on my dream. It had been absolutely terrifying.

* * *

 _The entire shop was in uproar. Chaos was everywhere. The few that had managed to make it outside when the robbers had revealed themselves immediately fled the scene, dialing 999 and screaming for help. The shop doors, which had been slammed open as panicked individuals barreled out of the scene, swung shut, and the screaming outside dulled down to a muted yelling. I became more and more aware of the click of the guns and the slap of boots on the wooden floor._

 _The rest of us unfortunate ones inside the shop were rounded up and left to cower in the middle of the shop. The uncomfortable position made my legs and my abdomen burn from the intense exertion, but I was too afraid to move._

 _If only I had done more wall-sits. I should have listened to my friends and their obsession with exercise._

 _Nevertheless, it was too dangerous to budge. If I even shifted one inch, or made any movement that could attract attention, I could be singled out. And if I did … I shuddered. I didn't dare even think about it._

 _And so there I knelt, head down, eyes closed, desperately hoping that today would not be my last day on this beautiful earth._

 _The next few minutes were agonizingly slow. Every step of the robbers behind me seemed to suggest that they were moving to my position. Every tap and click made my heart skip beats. The stress started to overwhelm me. I could feel tears threatening to burst from my eyes, and I noticed that some of the other women were already crying, silent sobs escaping from them, even as they desperately tried to mute the sounds to prevent the robbers from taking notice of their weakness._

 _I directed my eyes towards the ground, steadfastly avoiding anyone and everyone's gaze, but even so, I could see the shadows of everybody around me. Every single time a new shadow appeared, I flinched and held my breath, afraid that they were directing their attention towards me. At last, a single man stopped right behind me. I swore his gun was pointed right at my head._

 _My heart stopped._

 _As if on cue, Bonnie Tyler's_ Holding Out for a Hero _started playing behind the cafe's countertop. It would have been hilarious if not for the fact that I was in very real danger of dying._

 _I heard a blonde man beside me, someone I thought I recognized from the Imperial High School, start humming the song unconsciously. He had been one of the most hysterical ones when he realized what was happening, bursting into tears and whimpering for his mother. He realized what he was doing and stopped._

 _It was too late._

 _The man behind me slapped him hard with his weapon, and kicked him down. The rest of us flinched automatically away from him. I glanced at the blonde boy and his assailant out of the corner of my eye, holding my breath._

" _Awww, what a little crybaby," the assailant, who I did not dare not turn to look at, sneered. "Holding Out for a Hero, eh? Well, you won't be getting one. If you're lucky and you hand over all your money right now, maybe I'll spare your life. If you don't … well, I daresay you should be expecting a bullet instead of a hero." He laughed uproariously at his "clever" joke._

 _The blonde boy, whose name I think was Thomas, immediately burst into tears, digging his hands into his pockets and flinging everything he had at the man with the gun._

" _Please, oh god please don't kill me. I'll do anything you want! Anything!" he begged for his life._

 _The man sneered at Thomas. "We'll see. It depends on how much money you have. If there's anything less than one hundred in here, I swear to God –"_

 _His voice was cut off by numerous pops from outside, and I immediately tensed as I saw his shadow rapidly shift positions. I heard the man swear and duck instinctively, expecting bullets to come sailing through the window._

 _Silence._

 _The man snarled and growled to his accomplices: "Those fucking idiots made a move. Punish them."_

 _One of them, a hawk-nosed man with ice-cold blue eyes, hissed into the transmitter. "Looks like you're making some unwarranted moves out there, officers. I think we'll have to teach you all a lesson."_

 _He aimed his pistol towards a poor middle-aged woman, who had come into the shop looking to buy a cup of cappuccino for her son. He was kneeling right next to her, watching with fear apparent in his eyes. The woman started to cry and pleaded for her life._

" _No! Please, I'll empty my entire bank account for you, I swear it. I have a husband and kids, please have mercy, I–"_

 _The café speaker system crackled to life again, and I saw the man with the hawk-like nose twitch, almost pulling the trigger._

" _No! Don't shoot! We can still talk this out!" One of the officers outside demanded. The hawk-nosed man simply sneered in response, his fingers tensing. I held my breath, waiting for the sound of a shot that was sure to come._

 _My senses blurred into a cacophony of sound and motion._

 _The next thing I knew, I had been blown two meters away from where I had been kneeling before. An ever-present ringing filled the air, and my vision swam._

What the hell had just happened?

 _Then, with a rush of sound, the world righted itself._

 _Outside, I heard numerous booms as cop cars died fiery deaths, the blast of the explosions shattering windows in the shops all around. A bright orange glow from newly raging fires illuminated the inside of the now-dark café shop, the lights having been blown to smithereens in the initial explosion. Unfiltered, bright white light from posts outside the shop streamed in, the tinted windows having disintegrated into sharp shards of glistening glass that was now littering the floor. Broken tables and chairs strewn the floor of the once pristine shop, splinters embedded painfully in my arms and legs. Yells and shots echoed outside, people moving furiously in the distant and dark background._

 _I, with difficulty, glanced down at myself. My cream-colored sweater had been sliced in many places, stained red with what I desperately hoped was some sort of wine, not blood. My ripped jeans, too, now had even more holes than it had before, tiny glass shards having sliced through skin and flesh as they whipped past my body. The same red wine stained those jeans._

 _I noticed a large red cut on my thigh. A piece of glass the size of a plate lay on the ground next to me, its tip dyed red._

 _I suddenly realized that this café shop did not sell wine._

 _Screams emanated from the people beside me, as dark figures clad in black, swirling cloth stormed into the café. Before any of the robbers could do anything, the figures raised their hands and jets of green, purple, and menacing green light flashed. Within seconds, and with no resistance at all, all the robbers died, along with numerous people that were in the general vicinity._

 _Startled, I realized that they were not here to help. They were indiscriminately killing people, laughing with joy as they did so. The woman who had been threatened, along with her son, died as twin jets of green light impacted their heads. Their cold, lifeless bodies dropped to the ground, terrified eyes turned upwards towards the broken lights, unseeing._

 _One of the dark figures approached me. Under the hood, I saw pale lips curve into a lecherous sneer._

" _My my, what do we have here? A poor, innocent defenseless girl? Imagine what could happen to you…" his voice trailed off suggestively._

 _My blood froze solid._

 _I had always considered myself quite pretty, what with my auburn hair and light green eyes. Boys had always taken notice of me, although I was easily able to shake them off by acting aloof and cold. It usually worked._

 _But this was not just some hormonal teenage guy._

 _He clasped my arm and dragged me outside, towards the rest of his gang. My muscles still burned from the position they had been holding before the explosion, but somehow the shock, fear, and adrenaline pounding through my veins gave me enough energy to start furiously kicking._

 _It was of no use. His grip was like iron._

 _"Let's have a little fun, shall we?" He smirked to the rest of the members as he dragged me. "She's rather pretty isn't she … I think a dirty Muggle like her would love to spread her legs for real, powerful men like us. She would probably –"_

 _Another crack interrupted his terrifying speech, and I saw, with horror, another black clad figure appear next to them. His very presence emanated incredible power, and I was immediately on guard when I saw that the rest of my assailants respectfully fall silent in front of him._

 _He turned around, and I screamed mentally._

 _He was a hideous creature. He looked like a man, but his nose had flattened into two reptilian slits for nostrils. His eyes were a burning blood-red, and his pasty white, bald head emphasized his unnaturally snake-like features. His eyes roamed the people before him, and the instant his eyes connected with mine, my body wracked with shudders._

 _He seemed to enjoy my terror, smiling coldly at me for a split second._

 _My friends," he hissed, turning his attention back to the rest of the men. "What a fine night it is." I noticed his s's seemed to be drawn out. I could imagine a snake's tongue flickering out from between his pale lips, tasting the air for blood._

 _Naturally, my heart seemed to beat faster._

 _"Yes, my lord," replied everyone dutifully._

 _My captor took off his hood and his silver skull-like mask, revealing his long, silver-blonde hair. An aristocratic face, one that seemed as if it were used to looking imperiously at inferior beings, emerged from the hood, creased with fear. He bowed before his master. "My Lord, I have captured this girl. We were about to have some fun with her. My lord, if you wish, I would be happy –"_

 _"Silence, Lucius," barked the demon. I could feel Lucius' grip on me slacken and start to shake. I took a little joy from the fact that he was just as terrified as I was. "Are you, perhaps, giving me permission to do what I want? Hmmm, Lucius?" His red eyes stared back at Lucius challengingly._

 _"N- No, my Lord," Lucius whimpered. "I'm sorry, my Lord. I beg you to forgive this offense. It shall never happen again, my Lord."_

 _The Lord sneered at his henchman. "It had better not. If it does, Lucius, need I remind you that your wife and son …" he trailed off threateningly. He turned his attention to me, evaluating me. I felt like a little rat being examined by a cruel, yet majestic serpent. I almost instinctively groveled at his feet. "Nevertheless, this creature of yours does seem quite pleasing. Take her back to the Manor, Lucius. We can keep her as a little pet, meant to service us when we desire it." I desperately fought the shudder that ran through me. "I think that –"_

 _"My lord," another black-clad man interrupted him. I could see the snake-faced man's eyes flare, and narrow in pure rage. He raised his hand, whirling on the man who had interrupted him. A green light formed at the tip of a polished white stick he was holding._

 _"There is someone watching us."_

 _Everyone started, including me, and we all turned to see where he had been pointing. On one of the roofs was a man who was lying down on the dark shingles, a sniper rifle clasped in his hands._

" _What in the name of Merlin's saggy balls is he holding?" Wondered Lucius, looking suspiciously at the rifle._

 _I suddenly felt incredibly hopeful. If they didn't know what it was, then maybe the man on the roof could shoot them down before they could kill him. Then, I noticed the sniper's incredibly horrified look, and his complete lack of response._

 _"Thought you could stay hidden, hm? Enjoy your last moments on earth, Muggle." The snake-man's laugh was like the sound of nails on chalkboard, harsh and unpleasant to hear. A few moments after, the rest of the men started cackling too. Lucius, in particular, was giving it his best shot._

Speaking of shots, please shoot already, _I thought._

 _The laughter stopped. The snake-man lazily flicked up his hand. "Avada Kedavra," he drawled._

 _The green light that had been hovering at the tip of his wand leapt towards the man on the roof._

 _A final crack echoed through the air._

 _Lucius screamed in horror - I privately thought he sounded like a little girl - as a mist of red coated his body._

 _The snake demon fell, a shocked look on his face and a clean, gaping hole in his reptilian, white skull._

 _I tasted something a little salty, bitter, and fatty. Looking down, I saw that the same mist of red was coated all over my body. That demon's brains had been blown out of his head, and some of it had landed on me … and in my mouth._

 _I fainted._

* * *

 _When I next awoke, there was a concerned looking girl kneeling over me. She was about my age – roughly seventeen. It was still night, but the moon had shifted positions. Numerous dress-clad figures were sweeping around the area, conversing quietly in the background, their eyes creased and frowns apparent on their faces. Others, however, had looks of joy, and were weeping happy tears as they clasped hands with people around them._

" _Are you okay?" The girl asked gently, pulling my gaze back to her. Her warm brown eyes peered softly at me._

 _I nodded yes, unable to speak. My throat was particularly parched, and I regretted drinking the coffee that I had before the attack happened._

" _That's good. I healed your wounds – that gash on your leg was particularly nasty. It'll leave a scar behind. I couldn't do anything about that. I'm sorry."_

 _Blood still coated the gash in my jeans, but I fingered the hole. Nothing hurt, so I was satisfied._ _I glanced up to thank her._

 _She was gazing at me with analytical eyes, rolling a polished stick between her fingers thoughtfully. It was similar to one of those sticks that the dark-clad men were wielding as well. It took me a few seconds, too long, to connect the dots._

She's one of them.

 _I instinctively flinched back. Her brown eyes didn't seem so warm and kind anymore._

 _Noticing my actions, she held both her hands up in an "I surrender" pose, looking kindly at me. I didn't buy it. She tried to reassure me again, murmuring something to me._ _I didn't care, nor did I reply. I was too busy carefully watching the stick in her hands._

 _Nothing happened for a little while, both of us maintaining our carefully-held positions. Slowly, I realized that if she wanted to harm me, she could have done so already._

 _But perhaps she was just toying with me._

 _Determining that I should remain on guard, I decided to ask her about what was happening, and who she was._

" _Wh- Who are you?"_

 _She smiled, cocking her head to one side, her somewhat-bushy hair bouncing in response to the motion._

" _Hermione Granger. Pleased to meet you. And you are?"_

 _I frowned, deciding whether or not to lie to her and give her my real identity. If she knew who I really was, would she track me down and perhaps abduct me in the middle of the night? I took no chances._

" _Jennifer. Jennifer Greenbourgh. I'm a student at Imperial High." She looked amused, as if she knew I was lying. She opened her mouth to speak, but someone interrupted her._

" _Hermione! Obliviate her already! She's not important." A red-head boy yelled at her from inside the shop. Hermione looked annoyed at being interrupted, but then seemed resigned. Shaking her head, she sighed and raised her stick, pointing at me._

 _Dammit. I knew she was trying to kill me. That backstabbing mother of a banshee._

" _Obliviate non praecantationem," she whispered. A jet of opaque white light shot out and hit me before I could react._

 _I flinched, waiting for the pain and the darkness to overcome me._

 _Nothing happened._

 _I opened my eyes, relieved that I was not dead, and yet still afraid of the consequences of my survival. From my extensive knowledge of watching movies, I knew that villains always liked to torture and play with their victims before they killed them. I didn't want to die, but to suffer agony at the hands of an insane witch..._

 _I resolved to goad her into killing me before she decided that torturing me would satisfy her obviously insatiable penchant for violence._

" _I swear to God, the police are going to get you for this," I spat in her face, determined to die a quick and painless death. "They'll make sure you rot in hell for what you've done. You ought to burn for eternity for what you've done to these poor people. Your sodding mother would have rather mated - that's right I said mated, because she must have been a real animalistic beast to have some witch like you - mated with a three headed goat, at least then she would have produced an earthly being, you fat-faced - " I paused my rant when I realized she wasn't listening to anything I was saying, and wore a shocked look on her face._

" _You should be disoriented at least," she whispered in shock. Her eyes were distant, and her mind seemed to be spinning as fast as a pulsar, furiously trying to figure out what had gone wrong._

 _I snorted back at her. "Your crazy magic won't affect me, you evil witch."_

 _Hermione stared back at me. "Are you magical?" She questioned. In response, I spat on the ground in front of her. The thought of ever being related, or even compared, to one of these monsters was sickening._

" _I would never be one of your kind!" I snarled in response. "I would never torture, or kill, or main, or hurt innocents like your pathetic excuse of a race! You all deserve to rot in the deepest pits of hell for what you did."_

 _Instead of looking pissed and torturing me to eternity and back like I expected, Hermione looked understandingly at me. She waved two of her friends over: the red-headed boy who had yelled at her earlier, and another handsome black-haired, green-eyed guy. I mentally berated myself for thinking that last thought. They were my enemies. I couldn't think one was cute._

 _Hermione spoke to me. "I understand how you feel, Jennifer. Those people who attacked you earlier – those were Death Eaters. It's true that they are from our world, but they do not represent the Wizarding World as a whole – not at all. They're like terrorists in our world, people who like to torture people like you and pillage cities and towns. Most of us," she gestured to herself, the rest of the people walking around, and her two friends, "are not like that. In fact, I was just like you – I had no idea magic existed, until my letter for Hogwarts came and told me I had magic, and I was opened to a whole new world."_

 _As she spoke, she drew her wand. She raised her hands in a placating fashion once again. "I'm going to run a few spells to see if you are truly magical or not. I swear that I'm not going to hurt you."_

 _"Yeah, right," I snorted in disbelief. "Like you said how you were a friend before you tried to kill me?"_

 _"First of all, I didn't say I was your friend; I said that I was pleased to meet you," the girl stated. She realized what she said and seemed to retract her statement. I felt a brief dash of triumph - she had just proved my point. For some reason, it made me relax a little bit. "Plus, I wasn't trying to kill you. No offense, but you're defenseless right now. If I really wanted to, I could have done so already. I was using a mind-wipe spell because I didn't want you to remember this night. I'm sure, given your experiences, you can understand why."_

 _She glanced imploringly at me. I weighed my options. I was still furious at her underhanded attack against me, but I knew that even if she was trying to harm me, I couldn't stop it._

 _Plus I was surrounded by her friends, the impatient red-head and the cute dark-haired guy._

 _Damn it._

 _I reluctantly assented to her 'diagnosis'._ _"Fine. But if you try anything funny, I'll start screaming for help. And then you'll be screwed."_

 _Hermione looked amused at my steadfast resistance. She waved her wands, chanting under her breath. The dark-haired boy took this time to introduce himself to me._

" _Sorry about all this trouble, really. We need to take the time to make sure everything is alright and normal, given that – well, given that." He pointed, looking rather distant, towards the dead body of the snake-faced man, who was still lying in the exact position in which he had fallen. All the people who were walking around gave him a huge berth, as if afraid of him, even in death. I remembered the way his brains had splattered against my lips, and I immediately felt the urge to retch._

" _Woah, are you okay?" the dark-haired boy asked concernedly, breaking out of his distant thoughts. "You look a little green. Hermione, are you sure she isn't infected by any dark curses or whatnot?" I took a few deep breaths to calm my revolting stomach, deciding to ignore his remark about dark curses in order to prevent myself from hurling the night's dinner. I suddenly realized it was a bad idea to think about anything related to food._

 _Feeling sick again, I immediately banished that thought from my mind. It had little effect._

 _Hermione finished. There was a frown on her face, with detracted from her admittedly pretty appearance. She glanced at me._

" _It's weird. She has a magical core, there's no doubt about it," she said thoughtfully, completely ignoring the question. "It doesn't make sense, though. Hogwarts is supposed to send her a letter if she has a magical core and is a Muggleborn. There's no way that they could have let something like this through. The only explanation is that she developed her core recently, but that's impossible. It even says so in the "Arte of Magick, Vol. 31" by Miranda Maximoff. Magical cores develop to detectable levels precisely by the time the child is seven years old. That's a proven fact. How could this even be possible, Harry?"_

 _The dark-haired boy, to whom she had diverted her last question, answered, looking incredibly exapserated. "'Mione, you know that if you don't know the answer, neither do I. I would ask Dumbledore, but …" Harry's voice trailed off. The trio was silent for a moment._

" _Well," Harry resumed talking, forcing himself to stop dwelling on what seemed to be painful memories. "I suppose we could talk to the goblins. They seem to be the only ones who really even know what goes on with ancient things like Hogwarts' wards. Meanwhile, though, we need to get her to safety. She's not safe, given that all those Death Eaters had seen her face. She will be a target for sure."_

 _Feelings of intense worry rose to the surface within me. I would be targeted again? Remembering what had nearly happened the night before, I wrapped my arms around my knees. It was childish, sure, but it inexplicably made me feel a little bit safer. I did not ever want to be in a situation like that again._

 _Hermione looked calculatingly at me. "Harry," she whispered. "She could go to Grimmauld Place, couldn't she?"_

" _I suppose," Harry murmured. "It will keep her safe, I guess." He glanced at me suspiciously. A battle seemed to rage in his mind, but he took notice of my vulnerable state, and his eyes softened. Seeing him raise his wand, I flinched backwards, my gaze focused warily on his wooden stick. A small part of my brain humorously noted that I had probably flinched more in the past three hours than I had in the rest of my entire life._

" _Harry!" Hermione reprimanded, seeing me react. "What are you doing?"_

" _Putting her to sleep," Harry answered. He turned to me. "Sorry, but I don't really know you and I can't have you divulging the location of my safe house somehow. I promise that no harm will come to you under my watch, unless you turn out to be a Death Eater in disguise. You will essentially be placed under house arrest, but it's better than constantly worrying about whether or not you will die in the next five seconds, I suppose."_

 _Hermione lay a hand on Harry's arm, and turned to me._

" _Are you okay with this?" She gazed imploringly at me, and I could see a surprising amount of honesty and worry in them. She really wanted me to accept, and I could feel that she had my best interests at her heart. True, I would be essentially kidnapped by three people I didn't know, but something told me that they could be trusted. Plus, even if they did kidnap me, there was nothing that could possibly be done against them. I just had to hope that I would be safe. Reluctantly, I nodded yes._

 _Harry moved his wand, his lips moving silently. I could feel my eyelids growing heavy, and my limbs growing sluggish._

 _The last thing I felt before blissful sleep overtook me was hope that I made the right choice._

* * *

I shook my head to clear my train of thought.

I frowned at the unfamiliar room I was in. The walls were dusty and a dull grey, and no paintings hung on the wall. Sunlight streamed in from a dusty and dirty window, illuminating clouds of dust that were swirling inside the room, settling on a mahogany wooden paneled floor. I realized I was sitting on a bed that I had never seen before, and which seemed way too extravagant to have been owned by anybody I knew.

My day clothes were also switched out for a nice pair of soft pajamas depicting strange little balls of fur that resembled obese hamsters. The shirt proclaimed in fancy lettering: "Go go Puffskeins!" I had no idea when I had changed out of my old clothes, and I had no idea whose pajamas these were, for they definitely were not mine.

The rapidly growing suspicion that my incredibly vivid dream was not, in fact, a dream was steadfastly ignored.

I rolled up my pants. Checking the lightly tanned skin of my thigh, I found a scar – the scar of the wound that Hermione had healed in my dream.

No – it had not been in my dream.

It had actually happened.

I looked, panicked, at the door, deep in thought. I was in the "Grimmauld Place", if the conversation yesterday was to be believed. But where was that? Was I still even in London?

Footsteps echoed outside of my door, and the golden carved handle to the door turned. Hermione stepped in slowly, the lights from the outside hallways flooding in with a warm golden glow. Her bushy hair once again bounced in time with her steps and she stared at me, her brown eyes cautious.

"Hey," she greeted me, slightly wary. "I suppose you have some questions."

With firm proof in front of me, the day's events finally caught up to me in its entirety.

 _Everything had actually happened._ _I had nearly died._

And now I was in a house with a bunch of crazy magic-wielding teenagers who I had inexplicably allowed to kidnap me, and I was pretty sure no one but them knew where I was.

 _I'm screwed._

* * *

(A/N): Please review! I spent a lot of time working on this and I hope to get some feedback about my writing style / how the plot is developing. Anything going too fast or too slow? Please tell me!

Thanks guys! :D


	3. Chapter 2 - Realization

Disclaimer: This world and the characters in it are adapted from the world of Harry Potter by JK Rowling. I do not claim to own any of these characters or places, nor do I claim that this story is a part of the original canon of the Harry Potter series.

(A/N): Yay! Second chapter, I hope you like it. We'll truly start to delve into the magical world here.

* * *

Hermione edged into the room, coughing as the clouds of dust in the air irritated her nose. She waved her hand in front of her face, attempting to clear the air. It did naught but further excite the dust in the room. She continued to furiously fan the air, sneezing every few seconds.

 _Achoo! Achoo! Achoo!_

"Oh, screw it," she grumbled. She raised her wand and mumbled under her breath. A warm, orange glow emanated from her wand and illuminated the entire room. As I watched, the clouds of dust seemed to thin, and then vanish entirely. Hermione took a deep breath and released it, her nose still twitching from the irritating dust inside.

Putting her wand away, she eyed me, as if afraid that her display of magic would somehow send me into hysterics. I had to admit – if I was in her position, I would be quite cautious around myself too.

Then again, who can blame me? It's not every day you realize that magic is real, after being held as a hostage in a café shop, being rescued from the robbers by a bunch of terrorists, and then nearly being sold into slavery by those same terrorists.

And then having the lead terrorists' brains, blown out by a sniper, land all over your body.

Oh good lord.

"Please tell me you have a shower in here," I burst out, cringing at the thought that the Dark Lord's brains were _still_ sticking onto my skin. I felt shudders ripple their way throughout my entire body. I could almost feel the remnants of the Dark Lord's brain crawling together, forming a pink mass that throbbed and _lived_ inside me.

My stomach violently demanded secession from my body.

 _Disgusting._

Hermione looked at me queerly. She probably thought that I had somehow gone crazy after the events yesterday – after all, I didn't exactly leave the greatest impression after trying my best to insult her and resisting all her attempts to help me.

"We do, actually," she said. "Leave this room, turn right, and three doors down." I nodded, and immediately hopped out of the surprisingly soft bed. The floor of the room was surprisingly warm, the wood smooth, yet not slippery. Halfway to the door, I realized something, turning back to Hermione.

"Do you have any spare clothes for me to change into?" I suddenly asked, wondering where my old clothes had gone. I was momentarily saddened. That cream sweater was one of my favorites, after all. I had gotten it in New York City when my friends and I had gone there for vacation. It reminded me of happier, less stressful days, when all I had to worry about was looking good and maintaining my friendships. High school was a huge burden on my spirit, and the constant lack of sleep had left me feeling quite tired all the time. It was getting harder and harder to muster up the energy to wake up earlier in the morning to make myself look good for school. I sighed. High school was the least of my worries now.

Thinking about my friends, I suddenly realized that I had never told my parents where I was going, and immediately felt guilty. They had probably gone out of their minds with worry, and with yesterday's attack doubtlessly raging in the news, they probably thought the worst. I imagined my parents desperately calling the police station to find me, their faces marred with fear, and my guilt increased ten-fold. I resolved to call them immediately after I took a shower.

After all, my personal cleanliness took precedence over my parents' happiness and relief.

I'm a horrible person.

"Actually, we do have some," Hermione confirmed my question. "We repaired your sweater and your tank top. They're both completely clean and in the bathroom."

I nodded, relieved that my sweater was not gone forever. Besides some fond memories, my sweater had always been my lucky article of clothing. The fact that I had not died a horrible and painful death yesterday – or worse, been locked up in some musty creepy dungeon basement – had simply boosted its value.

"Thanks," I murmured to Hermione. She looked surprised, but nodded.

* * *

After taking a refreshing, hot shower, and scrubbing my skin a raw pink, I entered back into the room. I was surprised to see Hermione there, reclining against the wall with her nose buried in a book. _Arte of Magick, Vol. 31_ by Miranda Maximoff.

"Hey, isn't that the book you were talking about yesterday night?" I remembered that she had quoted some words from it while puzzling over my strange condition and something called "Bogwarts". Or "Hogworth"? I wasn't really sure.

"That's right," she said, surprised. "You have a pretty keen mind, to be able to remember something like that." She evaluated me in a different light, impressed with my memory. Shaking her head, she subsequently switched to another topic. "Good, my skirt fits you well."

I smoothed down the creases on the black skirt that I was wearing.

"Thanks. It's pretty nice. What happened to my jeans?"

"Couldn't repair them," Hermione sighed.

"So there is something you guys can't do." I was surprised. They could cause explosions with mere words and close wounds with a wave, but couldn't repair some sliced up jeans? My sweater was in mint condition, too. What was the difference between those two? They were just clothes, and I was pretty sure my sweater was a more complex item.

"Well…it basically fell apart when we took it off you. We can mend holes and tears, but when half the jeans are missing, there isn't really much we can do."

She fell silent. I sat down on the bed and glanced at Hermione, who looked as if she was lost in thought, avoiding the awkward silence that enveloped the room. Sighing, I closed my eyes and leaned back against the wall, feeling the bumps push roughly against my head.

 _Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock._

The grandfather clock, which looked to be in surprisingly pristine condition, counted out the seconds of the day. I watched the pendulum swing back and forth, back and forth. It was almost hypnotizing in its rhythm.

 _Swish. Swish. Swish._

I had no idea how long I had stared at the pendulum before I remembered something.

"Hermione – I need to call my parents. They're probably worried sick," I began.

"No worries," Hermione interrupted me. "You can use that phone over there, on the desk." She pointed towards an ancient looking device that looked as if it had come from the early 1800s. I could see gears and dials covering its surface, whirling softly. It reminded me of some steampunk creation that people had probably believed in back before the Civil War.

"That's a phone?"

Hermione laughed. "That's pretty much exactly how I felt when I tried to call my parents from this dusty old place." She frowned. I wondered why she had seemed so bummed out at the mention of her parents, and voiced my question.

Hermione shifted uncomfortably, and sighed. "I had to wipe their memories and send them off to Australia so that they wouldn't get hurt. Like I told you, Voldemort – the Dark Lord - likes to target Muggleborns, or, if he can't get at them, their families. If anything happened to my parents because of me, well," she swallowed. "I would never be able to forgive myself."

"Well, now that Voldemort," the word felt convoluted and strange to my tongue, "is dead, you can reverse it and they can come back, can't they?" I pointed out the fairly obvious solution to her misery.

Hermione shook her head.

"It's not that simple. The Death Eaters are still on the loose, and I'm sure they'd love to get revenge for the death of their master, especially on Muggles, since Voldemort was killed by one of them. That, compounded with the fact that I'm one of their highest priority Muggleborn targets, makes bringing back my parents a very risky idea. Plus, I'm not even sure how they'll react to me coming back for them. It's one thing to send your parents away to protect them. It's another thing to do it against their will. And then, topping that, is the fact that I wiped their memories and made them forget completely about me. If I was them, I'm not entirely sure I could forgive me."

Poor Hermione. All she wanted to do was help her parents stay safe, and now she was beating herself up over that fact. I suddenly saw her in a different light. She had seemed like such a foreign, almost alien being due to her association with magic, that I completely forgot that she had said that she came from a similar background as me, and that she was my age. She was just like me.

All of a sudden, she just seemed like a tired girl who was just struggling with problems in her daily life, just like the rest of us.

"I'm sure they'll understand what you've done." I reassured her softly. "Your intentions were pure. They must know that all you wanted to do was protect them."

Hermione looked downcast for a minute, turning my words over in her head. Finally, she sighed, subtly wiping a tear away from her eye. She smiled at me.

"Thanks."

A sudden impulse came over me.

"Abrielle."

"What?" Hermione looked confused.

"Abrielle Lane. That's my real name." I wasn't really sure why I had such a sudden urge to tell her who I really was, but I realized I trusted Hermione. Perhaps it was her confession, or the fact that she had worries just like the rest of us, but I now saw Hermione as any other, normal girl.

I understood her. Or at least I think I did.

"Abrielle, then. Thank you." She smiled radiantly, perking up a little more cheerfully with a tiny spark in her eyes.

I sent a tired smile her way. Feeling my muscles ache, I recognized how exhausted I really was, even after several hours of sleep. It was hard to believe that less than twelve hours ago, I was still obliviously working on my English essay, unaware of the existence of an entire world. That English essay seemed so unimportant now.

I closed my eyes and rested my head against the wall once more. We sat in a nice, quiet peace for a few moments, listening to the rhythmic ticks of the grandfather clock.

After a little while, Hermione got up.

"I'll leave you to call your parents. If you want some dinner, I expect Molly will have cooked some up. I'll be downstairs, in the dining room, with the others. If you want to come down..." she looked hopefully at me.

I nodded, my mind absently worrying about how I would reassure my parents that I was okay, and yet tell them that I wouldn't be home for a while. I, now more than ever, realized why Hermione was reluctant to retrieve her parents. I could still promise them to call them every day to alleviate their fears. Hermione could do none of that. She had to live with the painful fear of having her parents be disappointed in her forever, constantly wondering if they were better off now without her. I let out a deep breath, my guilt continuing to plague my consciousness.

Hermione, seeing my pensive look, looked understandingly at me, then closed the door.

* * *

I glanced around the enormous atrium on the bottom floor, trying to find the dining room that Hermione had mentioned. Sure enough, from a door to the left, there echoed the quiet murmur of speech, and the soft clinking of glass and utensils. There seemed to be a solemn air to the house.

In front of me was the door to the front yard, and freedom. I could escape right now if I wanted, but I had already decided to give these people a chance. They honestly seemed to have my best intentions at heart, and they knew much more than I did. If they said I was in danger, I would be wise to listen to them.

As I passed the portrait of the late Black matriarch Walburga Black and trudged to the dining room, my conversation with my parents slunk into my mind. They had initially been yelling, furious that I had made them so worried. Normally I would have made some pretty snarky replies in response to their excessive desire to control every aspect of my life, but I knew they had every right to shout at me. I should have done something to notify them that I was fine, even though I really hadn't had much of a chance to. Everything had happened too fast for me to coherently rationalize out my every move. I waited before their berating had ceased before I assured them I was perfectly safe. My mom's teary voice had nearly convinced me to stop, but I continued, telling them that I might not be back home for a little while.

That had caused another bout of yelling.

Eventually, they demanded to know where I was. When I told them that I did not even know that myself, my parents told me to hold the phone while they, suddenly cheerful, "ordered some pizza".

I had sighed, exasperated, before I told them that no, I was not being kidnapped.

Needless to say, it had taken over twenty minutes to convince them that I would be able to call them tomorrow, precisely at ten o'clock. When that was done, it took me a few more minutes for me to convince them that this would not be the last time that they would hear my voice. As I had hung up the phone, I swore I heard my mom letting out a few sniffles in the background.

I sighed. Figures that they would not believe me. I couldn't exactly blame them.

Shaking my head to clear my thoughts, I slowly came to a stop outside the polished wooden door. It was decorative and fancy, with beautiful curls and twirls that were reminiscent of classic Art Nouveau engravings. It spoke of a very - and I mean _very_ \- rich family, although come to think of it, it probably would be very easy to mimic that sort of design utilizing these people's fancy magic. Taking a deep breath, I checked my posture, back straightening, and smoothed out the wrinkles in my - Hermione's - skirt.

Here we go. Into a new and crazy world.

I pushed lightly against the heavy wooden door leading to the dining room. It swung open with surprising ease, although with a loud and obvious _creak_. All the muted conversations instantly stopped, and everyone turned to look at me.

I stared, rather uncomfortably, back at them, too self-conscious to notice my surroundings. They stared back at me. An awkward stare-off begun.

The stillness was broken by a matronly looking woman with ginger hair who jumped up from her seat, smiling warmly at me.

"Sit, sit, sit! There's a chair here just for you. Come, dearie, have some food. You look so skinny!"

The red-headed boy from yesterday groaned, food stored in his mouth, inflating them to two round chipmunk cheeks.

"Oo fthoun lek uh fedofile, Mumph," he rolled his eyes, talking through the mouthful of food.

Ew. I cringed in disgust. Hopefully not all of these people were not like this. Thankfully, I noticed that Harry, Hermione, and a bunch of the other red-heads and older men and women at the table were also looking half-horrified, meaning they had some sense of decency. Unfortunately, they also looked highly amused, as if they had seen this numerous times before.

The woman who was beckoning me over reached over and pinched his ear, hard. The boy yelped, a brief flash of the contents of his full mouth coming into view. "Manners, Ron," she scolded. "Especially in front of a young lady. And I do _not_ sound like a pedophile. Apologize." It occurred to me that this had happened so often that Ron's food-speech had become an understandable language to his mom. I winced.

Ron mumbled a completely indecipherable apology.

The woman, who I could only assume was Ron's mother, turned to look at me and patted the seat between her and Hermione.

"You must be hungry, dear. It must have been a tiring day for you. Eat up, eat up!"

I sat down in the ornate wooden chair, decorated with random swirls and depictions of what appeared to be dragons and other mysterious beasts. In contrast with its incredibly hard appearance, I found that all the surfaces appeared to be very soft and comfortable. Sinking down into the sofa-like chair, I savored the softness for a few brief moments, my eyes closed.

When I next opened my eyes, my plate, empty just a few seconds ago, had become a tiny mountain.

Hermione, next to me, laughed, watching my flabbergasted expression.

"Molly," Hermione reached over and interrupted her furious piling of food onto my plate. "Abrielle's hungry, but I think that's enough. I'll make sure she gets more if she wants it." I glanced incredulously at her.

There was enough food on that plate to last me several days. A week, even.

Molly clucked her tongue disapprovingly, but assented. She directed her kind gaze towards me. Her large presence, inexplicably warm and motherly, slowly filled me with a sense of safety that I never realized I had lacked ever since the attack. She smiled affectionately.

"Well, eat up then, dear. There's always more if you want seconds!" She seemed oblivious to the fact that I couldn't even finish half the plate, let alone the whole thing. A quick glance at the rest of the table showed that everyone was sympathetic to my predicament. It appeared that this was something that happened often.

 _I guess I'll just have to protect my plate from now on._

Nevertheless, my stomach was rumbling, and ached almost painfully. The hill of multicolored vegetables and finely minced steak, as well as heaps upon heaps of rice, tempted me to dig in. A tiny cliff rose from the sea of carrots, something that I suspected to be a gravy-covered croissant. Eyeing the various geological formations in this surprisingly realistic looking mountain - I spied a small forest of broccoli blooming next to a plain of purple cabbage - I decided to stick my spoon into a random location on the mountain, scooping up an entire spoonful and carefully transferring the precious cargo into my waiting mouth. A tiny avalanche of peas and chunks of cucumber rolled down the hillside, stopping at the very edge of the plate.

A heavenly eruption of flavor melted into my mouth, blinding all my other senses with its intensity. A moan escaped from my lips.

I wasn't even aware of the fact that I had barely been chewing and swallowing before shoveling more food into my mouth until I opened my eyes, well on my way onto my third or so spoonful. A quick glance around showed everyone's wide-eyed expressions. Even Ron was staring at me, one eye comically larger than the other. His spoon hovered halfway from his plate to his own mouth, dripping sauce onto the table.

 _Splat._

Feeling my cheeks burn, I concentrated only on slowly and daintily eating my next spoonful. I was careful to chew slowly, avoiding everyone's looks from sheer embarrassment. Even _Ron_ had been horrified. It was all I could do to stop banging my head onto a table.

 _Way to leave a good impression, Abrielle._

"Blimey," someone whispered across the table. "She's worse than Ron. Ain't that right, Fred?"

Silence.

Hermione tensed next to me.

I looked up, mortified at the blatant remark on my embarrassing lack of table manners, only to see the entire table looking incredibly solemn, and paying no attention to me at all. The one who had spoken, a tall ginger – I suddenly realized that wasn't much of a defining characteristic – broodingly seemed to mentally berate himself.

"Sorry, Mum," he mumbled, the rest of the table looking silently at their plates. I frowned, looking at their downcast eyes. Had I done something terribly wrong and insulted these nice people? I immediately rushed out an apology.

Hermione was quick to assure me that it wasn't my problem. "Fred – well, Fred was one of the Weasley brothers. He –" She paused, glancing at George. He looked back stonily at her. She lowered her voice. "He died in one of the battles with Voldemort. George is his identical twin. They had a really close bond, closer than most, and so his death – well, it really shattered him. They had been inseparable since birth. Even a few months ago, Molly had some problems telling those two apart, and she's their mom." I glanced up at George, who simply looked depressed. He pushed his abundantly filled plate away from him, and stood up.

"I'm not hungry anymore," he said, turning and walking out of the room. I could hear him trudge up the stairs and close the door to his room.

Silence blanketed the room, everyone's appetite completely disappearing. I felt absolutely horrible, knowing that I had indirectly caused this reaction. Guilt slowly ate its way through my heart.

My ravenous hunger for food vanished into thin air.

Molly, as if sensing my distress, spoke up with a fake cheerfulness. "We'll just save some food for him, I suppose. He'll come down eventually." She plastered on a happy smile and continued to eat.

Hermione, too, seemed to be eager to divert her attention away from the depressing mood that had overcome everyone. She nudged me. "Eat," she commanded. I obligingly did as she asked.

"So," Hermione looked at me calculatingly. "Abrielle. Have you ever noticed anything … weird happening around you? In your childhood? Ever?"

I frowned, casting my mind back as far as I could remember. "I mean, I suppose there were a few times. I mean, once I had this Algebra I class, and there was this guy named Ryan in it. Every single time I sat next to him, my test grades dropped to C's. And his rose to A's. I never quite figured out why that happened. Does that count?"

Hermione frowned, shaking her head. "No. I mean, anything … _really weird_? Like, instantaneously teleporting when you need to, finding things where they could have never been, et cetera?"

I shook my head no.

Hermione frowned even more. "Are you sure? Anything. I mean anything that could be magical at all."

"Nope, unless you count me going to Disney World?"

Hermione laughed, but shook her head. "That's strange … you should have at least _one_ incident of magic. After all, it says so in the Arte of –"

"Magick, Vol. 31 by Miranda Maximoff. Jesus, you know that book well, don't you?" I finished for her. Hermione looked suitably abashed, and Harry and Ron laughed.

"First of all, it's Volume thirty- _three_ , not thirty-one."

I smirked at her, Ron and Harry laughing harder. She flushed red as she basically proved my point. Ignoring me, she continued. "Secondly, it's a widely proven theory. Purebloods undergo dozens of incidents, if not hundreds. That's in addition to their _deliberate_ magical training. Muggleborns like me still go through at least five or six incidents. To go through none – well, that's unheard of!"

"So … what you're saying is that I'm a magical freak." I stated drily. Ron laughed.

"I like her a lot, she's funny." He grinned. Hermione, having opened her mouth to reply to my comment, placed her hands on her hips, looking crossly at Ron. Harry, catching her look, nudged Ron sharply in the ribs.

"Wha–" He turned to glare at Harry, before catching on and turning to Hermione. "Oh, sorry Hermione. You know that I of course like you more. That is, I love you more. I mean I suppose that we aren't far enough that I can say that I love you – that is, unless you want me to, in which case–" Ron stopped himself, realizing that the more he talked, the stupider he looked. He glanced hopefully at Hermione, who still continued to glare at him. He gulped. "Well, there goes my relationship."

My eyes darted between Ron and Hermione. I refused to believe that such an intelligent, if bookworm-ish girl was dating such a idiotic slob. I turned questioning eyes towards Harry. His green eyes looked amusedly at me, as if he was wondering the exact same thing.

Hermione blatantly ignored his last remark.

" _Anyways_ , as I was about to say before _Ronald_ interrupted me," she casted a disgruntled glare towards her boyfriend, who looked suitable apologetic. "You aren't a freak. It's just … a curious incident. That's all. That being said, that makes me wonder. Did you get your magical core recently, through some freak accident, or did you have it all along, and it simply developed late? Curious, curious …" Her voice trailed off thoughtfully.

I finished off my plate – I could not believe I had eaten that much – and leaned against the back of my chair. I imagined how much I would have to run to burn off all those calories. I'd probably have to run an entire marathon every day for a week straight. Oh joy.

I had a sudden thought. "You said I have a magical core already. Is there any way I can start practicing some magic right now? Is there some special ritual I have to go through?"

Hermione looked surprised at my question and my eagerness. "There's no special ritual or anything, no. You just need to get a wand, preferably at Ollivander's. I don't really know if he's open, considering it's the evening and he just got back from his … stay at Malfoy Manor, but we can't really do much for you until we can visit him. Sorry."

"Wait." It was Harry. He fished something out of his pocket and tossed it to me. I caught the long stick by its wooden handle. Immediately, a warm flush spread through my arm. "She can use my old wand. If I really have to use magic, I'm sure the Elder Wand will service me well."

"That's right," Ron realized. He turned to Harry, who was holding another wand in his hands. "You still have the Elder Wand. Voldemort dropped it after he fled Hogwarts, right?" Harry nodded.

"I ripped it from his hands during the Priori Incantatem. I wanted to throw it away, but I guess I have a use for it now."

"Throw it away?" Ron exclaimed. "That's the _most powerful wand in existence_ , Harry. Are you crazy?"

Harry shook his head. "It's dangerous, and if it falls into the wrong hands, we could have another Voldemort. Plus, it doesn't matter anymore. I'm keeping it now, aren't I?"

Ron grumbled. "I suppose, but you and I need to have a talk, Harry." Harry rolled his eyes, but agreed. He turned back to me.

"Try it out," he encouraged. "It almost guaranteed won't work for you, but we'll give it a go. Give it a wave or something."

I raised my eyebrow. Give it a wave? What, did he expect a magic hat with a rabbit inside to appear from nothing or something? Rolling my eyes, I did as he suggested.

A black top hat spontaneously burst into existence in front of me, falling onto the table with a small _thunk_. Something inside the hat squeaked. The room suddenly went silent. I froze.

I cautiously reached into the hat and grasped a squirming, furry body. Lifting my hand up, I came face to face with a tiny ball of fur. Judging from the little pictures of similar creatures on my pajamas, they were Puffskeins. I released it from my grasp, and it dropped back into the hat, muffling its little squeaks.

Everyone at the table was looking at me suspiciously. I heard a soft gasp from my right.

Hermione, Ron, and Harry were busy conversing in muted tones. I heard a few phrases and words, like "Not possible", "Not again", and "Escape into". They turned to look at me cautiously, as if I had suddenly transformed into a menacing beast.

I felt like a deer caught in the headlights, stuck and with no idea what was happening. "What?" I heard myself say.

"Nothing," they echoed in unison, innocently. I stared back at them, unconvinced, daring them to lie to my face.

Hermione was the first to relent. "Well, it's simply that a wand doesn't simply just work for anyone. Wands are semi-sentient, so they can feel the magical essence of a person. They try to match with a person whose magical core matches theirs. They essentially refuse to obey anyone else besides their one true master. The fact that you can just randomly waltz in and use Harry's wand – well, the chances of that are astronomically low. Only other people who have very similar wands can–" She paused as Harry frantically nudged her, eyes widening as she quickly backtracked.

"Well, the point is that the chances are nearly impossible. It's great that it works, though. Perhaps I could teach you some spells then, today?"

The trio looked suspiciously uncomfortable as I, through sheer willpower, tried to pry the information they were hiding from me from their heads. I hated being lied to. Something about their expression told me that something was off, especially the fact that they simply refused to meet my eyes.

After several minutes, my eyes burned enough that I gave up the fight. I turned to Hermione, who was looking at the wall behind me, suddenly finding the rough beige walls incredibly interesting.

"I'll take you up on that offer, then, Hermione."

She started and then, seeming to realize that I was talking about the magic lessons, nodded. "We can start now, if you want," she offered.

* * *

The basement was filled with odds and ends, and piles of excess furniture and chests. Dusty tomes sat atop jewelry boxes, still filled with glistening golden necklaces and emerald-studded rings. I had an uneasy feeling, scrutinizing all the strange little devices. Why was there was so much stuff left there to sit in the dust?

I caught sight of a beautiful platinum necklace, with a series of sapphires studded inside and an elegant dragon motif as its centerpiece. _Come and pick me up,_ it seemed to call. Shining, it beckoned towards me, the reflection of the lights twinkling and winking at me, like little stars.

Hermione put a hand against my arm. I hadn't even realized that I had taken several steps towards the pile. She warned me against investigating further. "This house was owned by the Blacks, a pretty dark family. As such, there's a plethora of cursed items and dark magic hidden inside those piles. If you don't want to get your arm ripped off by some mutant chomping chair, I would suggest that you don't go near that hill of discarded … treasures."

Needless to say, I stayed far away while Hermione taught me the basics of self-defense, a _Protego_ charm. She waved her wand around in a smooth movement, arcing up and then down to the left in a gentle slope. It was a suspiciously familiar movement, one that I had probably seen in the battle that had taken place last night. "Protego," she murmured.

A translucent, almost invisible barrier slipped into existence in front of her, distorting her appearance slightly. It looked fragile, almost like a bubble. "Try it," Hermione encouraged.

I wasn't entirely convinced that it would protect me against a fly trying to pass through, much less a few spells of devastating impact. I rolled my eyes and, muttering the magic-words, cast the spell.

A warm surge flooded my entire body, concentrating on my right arm. It was almost burning hot, like I was putting my arm right above the licking tongues of fire in a hearth. For a brief moment, I was worried that I had somehow ruptured all the blood vessels in my body, and that this was one of the last feelings I would have before I died from massive internal bleeding. Before I could start freaking out, however, the feeling seemed to pulsate and, with a sudden spark, leapt from my chest to my fingers, like an electric jolt.

With a whoosh, a barrier was erected in front of me. Through its shimmering and translucent surface, I could see Hermione, looking astounded.

"You got it on your first try!" She exclaimed, mouth having fallen open. "That's incredible! It takes magically powerful students at least several tries to do it right, and even Harry, who is basically a Defense prodigy, needed to take two or three!"

"I don't know how I did it." I sheepishly tried to explain my success away, not content with being thought of as a prodigy just because of beginner's luck. "It just felt right. I went with my instinct. It felt pretty familiar too, for some reason. Weird, huh?"

Hermione's eyes suddenly went guarded. She inspected my face with a frown on her face, looking simultaneously worried and awed. I could almost see the gears in her head whirling.

A few seconds passed. Hermione, muttering, nodded to herself. Cautiously, she asked:

"Abrielle, there was a portrait on the wall in the atrium. Did you see it?"

I frowned. Why did she suddenly want to talk about that portrait? It wasn't anything noteworthy, and it really had no applications nor context to our current topic – not to my knowledge, at least. Perhaps she was testing my perception? I supposed that that was a topic of importance to anybody who wished to learn to fight well. I needed to be aware of my surroundings.

Determined to show Hermione that I had what it took to be a good fighter, I answered as thoroughly as possible.

"Yeah, it was on this gilded golden frame. The portrait was primarily consisted of muted and dark colors. The woman who was the subject was sitting down; I think with her hands clasped in her lap, although I'm pretty sure she moved – funny, huh? She was facing to the left, I believe. Other than that, I didn't really notice anything. What would be so special about a portrait of Walburga Black?"

Hermione, who had looked more and more relieved as I had thrown in details about the painting, suddenly regarded me suspiciously. She seemed to want to speak several times, but she couldn't find the words. Eventually, she just forced herself to speak, asking a question that I realized I had no answer to.

"How do you know about Walburga Black?"

* * *

(A/N): Yay! Cliffhanger! Wonder why Abrielle knows about Walburga Black, eh?

Please review! I spent a lot of time working on this and I hope to get some feedback about my writing style / how the plot is developing. Anything going too fast or too slow? Is there too much random dialogue? Is there not enough character development? Please tell me!

Thanks guys! :D


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